


Because I could not stop for death

by Armaria



Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: It blew up far more than I thought, Multi, Not Beta Read, Pre-Canon, Pre-Relationship, References to Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, The REALLY first one, The first escape attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-24
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:54:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27504907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Armaria/pseuds/Armaria
Summary: Zagreus had always wanted to break out of Hades, though there is no escape. There had not been an escape, but there had been a legend, the legend nobody knew....except for Apollo, and this was the reason why Apollo was now permanently banned from the Underworld and not around to help his cousin break out, otherwise Zagreus would probably have remembered that little accident called:Escape Attempt: 0
Comments: 16
Kudos: 62





	1. The Gates of Hades

If asked why he had started his mad and somewhat destructive nihilistic rampage towards the Surface, Zagreus, Prince of the Underworld would be truly hard-pressed to confess as to a _why_.

Oh, he knew the who (Nyx, Achilles, even dear old _Father_ ) and when (probably as soon as Achilles certified he was skilled enough to fight his way out) but even fighting shades, wretches and grinding Theseus' smug face into the Elysian Fields could not account for a _why_. This was much before he realised that his Mother was still on the Surface; Persephone could claim credit for many things, but the initial urge had all been him, and all the Furies could account for that.

Zagreus had always wanted to break out of Hades, though there is no escape. There had not been an escape, but there had been a legend, the legend nobody knew.

...except for Apollo, and this was the reason why Apollo was now permanently banned from the Underworld and not around to help his cousin break out, otherwise Zagreus would probably have remembered that little accident called:

_Escape Attempt: 0_

* * *

In a fit of inspiration once described as divinely bestowed, the playwright and tragedian Euripides once managed to write a rather terrible satyr play named _Alcestis_. Euripides never did find out that the words of Apollo at the play's opening were in fact, very true.

The summary: because his brat Asclepius created a medicine for death Zeus resolved the problem with a lightning bolt to the boy. Being unable to retaliate immediately against the thunder-bearer, Apollo had gone to behead the Cyclopes who had fashioned the lightning bolts. Thus threw Zeus in a hissy fit whereby Apollo was thus banished to servitude which was full of homoerotic bents between himself and the master, Admetus son of Pheres, King of Thessaly.

Now Admetus, despite this ambiguous thing going on with his Olympian oxherd, still had to get married on family orders and thus Apollo played wingman to help him win his bride, arrange his wedding, and clean up the mess where Admetus made the rather silly mistake of missing out a sacrifice to Artemis. You know, his oxherd's twin sister? There is definitely something going on there with Apollo if he was going this far.

So, in the sort of peer-pressure drinking party which would have made his half-brother Dionysus proud, Apollo managed to get the Fates well and truly drunk, enough to extract and IOU and a concession that someone else could die for Admetus. Needless to say, Admetus was supremely happy, save for the mild fact that he had asked precisely nobody beforehand and thus every mortal in his acquaintance, except his wife, understandably said: _no_.

Thus Apollo was left watching as a newly appointed Thanatos escorted the woman's shade and left King Admetus of Thessaly a grieving wreck, and where Euripides wrote of Apollo prophesising that Heracles would be crashing by in a moment to wrestle Death, the truth was far more prosaic:

Apollo stole after them, right into the House of Hades.

* * *

Before the gods and deathless ones, even mortal royalty were servants. Nowhere else was this more exemplified in the House of Hades - more than one king had stumbled in for judgement in the courtrooms with a bribe on their tongue, and then were struck dumb when faced with the riches of the Underworld, and the king who owned _everything_ under the earth. Much had been described of Olympus and its shining columns, airiness, and feasts, yet the heavy gloom of the House of Hades at the depths of Tartarus matched it in opulent austerity, if the two contradictory words could be applied.

"So this is what Uncle's been hiding," Apollo whispered almost to himself, hidden as another shade in the long, long, _long_ queue to the great hall waiting for judgement.

"Hey bro, not to put it on too fine a point, but _why am I here_?" The winged messenger Hermes complained behind him.

"You owe me, for not ratting you out to Maia." Apollo said. "So I need a guide if I'm planning to borrow one of the shades."

"Hey, is this anything to do with your ex's dead wife? Because they all come back sooner or later here-"

"Yes, so Uncle can... overlook about fifty years," Apollo summed up. "I wouldn't have made it for a year without Admetus. I won't be able to face him if I didn't manage this _tiny_ favour."

By the entrance of the west wing stood Night incarnate, and over by the Pool of Styx itself-

"Welcome to Hades, where pretty much everyone comes sometime!" dark-skinned young Hypnos drifted over, checking. It seemed strange that Underworld bureaucracy had children capable of writing, yet Alcestis was certain that any of the deathless ones in this realm was far older than they looked to mortals. "Hmm... you don't look like the King of Thessaly we've been expecting. Bro, did you get the wrong soul?"

"I am nothing if not thorough, Hypnos," Death replied to his own brother. "Read the note from the Fates."

"I see, Apollo got the Fates drunk and relented, so the Queen took his place. Well, welcome Queen Alcestis to Hades!"

"Lord Hypnos," Alcestis demurred, even behind the funerary veil which had been the clothes she was buried in.

"Don't worry, the Shades aren't so bad, the view of the Phlegethon is brilliant at night... or day, whichever," Hypnos quickly scribbled on his papyrus-covered slate with a cane-pen. "Received- hey!"

The black carbon ink in the pen had leaked, dribbling inky darkness over the letters and then some. The cause was quickly identified as a sharply-sliced hole by the reed that caused the leakage.

"Got you, Hyp!" A boy laughed behind them, jumping out. Draped in a crimson chiton with a pauldron bearing a three-headed dog motif, flames licked his feet yet did not singe the rugs of the great hall. Upon his head there was crowned a chaplet of flaming leaves. "Hi Than!"

"Zagreus," Thanatos inclined his head. "That was official parchment-work which needs to be filed-"

"No, that's something Hypnos randomly scribbled the names of the expected shades who come in," the boy Zagreus stuck out his tongue. "It's got his shopping list behind it. Unless gyros and an illegal nectar order are something worth _filing_."

"Zag!" Hypnos complained. "You ratted me out!"

"You wrote the list of incoming souls on your _shopping list_?!" Death sounded about as equally outraged. "Hypnos! If the Master or Mother finds out-"

"No he won't Nyx loves me," the boy pouted. "Hi miss! You look... well, like everyone."

"Greetings my lord," Alcestis, eyes flickering from Thanatos and Hypnos to the boy, apparently caught on fast that this boy had no ordinary identity. "I am Alcestis, daughter of Pelias. My husband is King Admetus, of Thessaly."

" _Oh_." the boy stood straighter, and tried to make the appropriate salute while not messing up his pronunciation. "My Lady, I am Zag... Zagreus Aidoniades Katachthonios, of the House of Hades."

"My Lady," he added when no answer was forthcoming.

Behind the little group of three- no, four chthonic gods and one shade - Apollo and Hermes exchanged looks of equal shock.

"Uncle Hades _reproduced_?!" came Apollo's loud whisper.

"We have a _cousin_?" Hermes cackled in glee. "I'm not the baby of the family anymore!"

Somehow the queue got shorter and shorter and shorter, until Alcestis stood before Hades.

"Queen Alcestis," Hades checked, before he glanced up from his paperwork. "...Zagreus, quit disturbing the shades."

"Oh no, His Highness has been a kind boy," Alcestis warmly replied. "He looks like my Eumelus would seem if... if I had lived to see him grow up."

"Hmm." The god of the dead hummed in thought. "You have a son?"

"A- And a daughter, my lord."

"So you are well-versed in childcare?"

"...I have raised a son and a daughter, if that is your reasoning, my lord."

"Very well." Hades declared. "As Zagreus has taken a shine to you and his primary carer is oft preoccupied with her duties, you will become his nanny."

"...excuse me?"

* * *


	2. Planning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "He is Prince of the Underworld. There is no society here for him. Night has come." And Nyx turned on one foot and... disappeared.

"Great, now she's permanently in Tartarus, let's go already!" Hermes was still pacing around.

The pair of them were hidden at one of Charon's boating bazaars on the river Lethe beside the Elysium Stadium, because apparently the thing in fashion to do when you're permanently on ferry duty was to set up a _floating market_. Charon was currently hawking the latest mortal craze of sanagaki cheese to passing shades queuing to watch the sons of Pelops bash each other's brains out in a rare tour outside of Tartarus. Proof, once again, that grudges did have a way of following you down into Hades.

"This isn't the simple smash-and-grab now, not even the last mess with your boy can match breaking her out of Tartarus," Hermes ticked off. "Erm, we'd appreciate your silence, Charon."

"Grrrrrnnnnnn...." The boatman continued to ply his trade.

"I must try," Apollo sighed. "I had thought that it would be a simple matter of waylaying a Shade, but it seems that Alcestis possessed her own will to be able to speak and communicate."

The shades of the dead possessed neither a mind of their own, nor wit to care about the surface world. The fact that Alcestis could even answer more than an 'I can't remember' was more than Apollo could have hoped.

"It would make her removal much harder, as she would be noticed," Apollo reflected.

"Hey, bro... you're serious? Serious?!" Hermes fidgeted. "Look, the two of us may have gotten off on a bad foot at the start-"

"You mean when you stole _my_ oxen as a baby-"

"-and I totally made up for it with a lyre, the first-ever lyre ever, so can I be excused from this really ill-advised heist you're planning on our Lord Uncle on his kid's nanny? 'Cause the kid would _really_ notice."

"Well, he has a primary caretaker, right?" Apollo reasoned. "Maybe I'll check if the caretaker would come back."

* * *

The House of Hades could in no way conform to Surface standards of architecture, instead reflecting the influence of its King in every corner. There was a central _megaron_ lined by columns, leading straight to Hades's office and throne, and two propyla on either side leading off, presumably to other chambers or living quarters or even the gynaeceum.

As for why no shade dared to sneak away: by the large marble desk there stood an equally large dish carrying bones which comforted the shades only by virtue of being too large to be human; everyone knew the son of Echidna didn't stoop to _eating_ them if necessary.

"Administrative chamber is the west wing, so the gynaeceum should be the east wing," Apollo deduced.

"Been to a lot of gynaeceums then, bro? Maybe when seducing some princess during the one year you were herding for mortals?"

"Haha," Apollo gave a dry laugh. "You say it as if an oxherd was a domestic slave who could sleep in the _megaron_. Never mind that as a man I cannot step inside one for propriety's sake, I had my own outbuilding thanks to Admetus."

"See, this is assuming that the goddess our Lord Uncle married--if that did happen--would _be_ in the gynaeceum," Hermes pointed out. "S'not like he has that many options."

Steam wafted out of one door, one that Apollo turned his back to almost immediately. "Lounge, servant's quarters," Apollo muttered, tracing the rich bas-relief carvings along the cavernous colonnade which led somewhere into the depths of the house. "The Underworld's darkness is here. If I were our Lord Uncle hiding away a wife and children, I'd put them here."

"Works for me." Still under the cover of invisibility and inaudibility, Hermes followed Apollo through the colonnade and into a cavernous room-

-and doubled back out, and out, and into the Lounge.

* * *

Looking up from the papyrus pages of a codex titled _Calliope's Epics for Children_ , Night herself looked distantly towards the trembling nanny. "I understand that our Lord has been rather indelicate in his hiring decisions," she said. "That a Queen like yourself enters service after a worthy death."

"All shades are slaves of the Rich One, my lady." Alcestis demurely replied.

"Papa doesn't treat anyone as slaves," Zagreus piped up, and now Alcestis could make out his eyes; one the crimson of blood, the other the verdant leaves of spring. "Only as burdens he wished would get a move on with their lives and stop giving his work. I'm gonna help him one day!"

"Now, Zagreus, there is all the time in the worlds to prepare," Nyx spoke, her voice the indulgence of a devoted mother.

"I can't wait to get out there. In the name of Hades!" Zagreus proclaimed with the starry-eyed look of an impressed boy still in hero-worship of his father. "Will Father come later?"

"Yes, yes. Go to sleep, my child." Nyx echoed, yet Alcestis's back straightened at the sadness in her voice. She saw Nyx regard Zagreus as the latter was tucked into a comfortable bed with a complicated look; her experience as a mother told her it was one of a mother who knew the father was not coming, yet could not bear to tell him otherwise.

Nyx rose almost taller when Zagreus finally fell to the spell of Hypnos--or his mother--and beckoned to Alcestis. "Come," she said. "Our work for today is done, at least what passes for the day."

"But the Lord..."

"He will not come," came the simple reply. "The Lounge is where all servants of the House go to on their time off. You may start there for the time being. Zagreus will need to be woken after four turns of the clepsydra. You will wake him, and dress him for breaking fast, before he will take a constitutional and then some morning readings."

"My lady?" Alcestis repeated. "Does he not have a...tutor? A male tutor, one who can bring him out into society?"

"He is Prince of the Underworld. There is no society here for him. Night has come." And Nyx turned on one foot and... disappeared.

It took a while for Alcestis to comprehend, and then sigh at the gods she could not comprehend before descending down the colonnade.


	3. Deduction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "That was the whole reason you pulled me into this, isn't it? I am, after all, the only being in the whole of the cosmos who could find him in time."
> 
> A/n: Because I love writing a conspiracy, what was planned to be a simple cracky premise evolved into a gambit roulette, hahaha.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, I'm already the fastest of the gods, you're not taking the post," Hermes joked once he had caught up to Apollo.

"When I said 'check', seeing the kid's primary caretaker as Mother Night herself was _not_ within expectations." Apollo panted a while later, hiding in the lounge room of the House of Hades, and being overlooked by the fact that most of the occupants were out on patrol.

"Tell me 'bout it, I didn't need to see anyone reading out loud _Calliope's Epics for Children_ for bedtime reading," Hermes moaned, as he recalled fleeing from the sight of Nyx herself standing with a little Zagreus and his awkward new nanny. "And the story of Perseus, oh Perseus. If I have to go through _one more_ rendition of the brat borrowing my sandals- wanna grab the nanny and run?"

"In the same room as holy Night? Sure, let's ask our lord father along and hopes he doesn't _flee_!" Apollo complained over another glass of (bootleg) nectar. Apparently his Lord Uncle had deemed ambrosia and nectar luxury items and banned them, so the chthonic pantheon were taking their drinks on the sly.

"A pity we're leaving then, because I saw an actual Moryus vintage of sampi-koppa-theta- right in the corner!" Hermes tried to dive for it, earning him a dirty look from the Wretched Broker and the Head Chef.

"May I join you gentlemen?"

Apollo and Hermes turned around to see-

"Alcestis?!"

* * *

Alcestis sat across the table from the two gods, with a cup of wine. For the first time she wore no veil or the dress of a married woman, dressed instead in the linens that bore the sigil of the great House. "Forgive my appearance, it seems that the House residents and staff are far more... at ease. It would seem remiss to be too polite."

"Daughter of Pelias, you do your house and husband proud," Apollo sighed. "It is I who failed your husband."

"And I'm totally not involved, but I can't help but follow the run of [Pheme](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pheme), so... the boy?" Hermes chipped in

"I left him in the east wing with his... primary caretaker." Alcestis carefully chose her words.

"Not his mother?"

"Those were the words of Night."

"...huh." Apollo inclined his head at the non-answer.

"I am unsure if it is a question of legitimacy, or if such matters down here as it did up there," Alcestis slowly spoke. "Yet despite bearing his father's name he is not raised as the son of a great ruler."

When faced with stunned looks Alcestis merely stated: "I am a wife and mother, but I too am a Queen, and thus I had to prepare my children for the roles I know they must take on in life."

"Right. The mortality thing."

"Considering that most princes take over only when their fathers... die... Hades might just not be intending to hand the throne over."

Alcestis shook her head. "Where is his _paidagaigos_? Where are the arms, the armour, the toys that are gifted to boys? Where is there any mention of having a boy in the house, let alone educating the boy into public life?"

Apollo opened his mouth, and then: "...ah."

"A _paidagaigos_... a tutor?" Hermes caught on, possibly having spent more time amongst mortals as his patronage of commerce demanded, even despite Apollo's recent crash course. "Of course he has a tutor, an older man who is not his father. This is... Queen Alcestis, I see your point. It is as if... as if Hades never intended for the boy at all."

"I do not know if the gods-"

"No, daughter of Pelias. There would be celebrations of the child's birth, fetes all around... or what passes for those here, no way Olympus could have missed it..." Apollo started. "Look, even the Hero of Tiryns was feted! You can see him later!"

"They do it differently here under the earth," Hermes cut in, his expression solemn as his brows knitted together. "I mean, not like we were _around_ for the birth of Ares... or Athena's, if that counted..."

Alcestis kept her silence as the two male gods began to discuss it:

"So, when was the last time a birth was celebrated up there?"

"You mean, when Queen Hera wasn't plotting to murder it?"

"...right."

Apollo turned to Alcestis at that. "But our Lord Uncle is definitely holding a grudge," he said to her. "Not just about Admetus, also about... us, I suppose, and the Fates for allowing this whole thing."

"I am glad to sacrifice my life for my husband," Alcestis firmly replied.

"Your husband would gladly do the same too," Apollo immediately replied. "The issue, though, is how to get out of Tartarus, in the name of Hades, so that the Kindly Ones don't follow you all the way back to Thessaly by Thrace. I'll see you once I come up with something."

Alcestis nodded, and left.

"...it makes no difference, you know," Hermes said at last.

Apollo did not answer.

"This whole 'swapping deaths', 'taking your lover's place in death' thing, it doesn't work like that," Hermes pointed out. "No, what you want is to overturn the case against Asclepius, make a precedent, make Hades break his own law against resurrection of the dead. Only then will our Lord Father grant what you've been petitioning all this while..."

"You talk too much, Argeiphontes."

"You don't talk enough, Sauroctonos." Hermes's eyes glittered. "That was the whole reason you pulled me into this, isn't it? I am, after all, the only being in the whole of the cosmos who could find him in time."

* * *

Having left the audience with her husband's divine patron and his half-brother, Alcestis found herself watching the clepsydra. Service was slightly unexpected to her as a late Queen, yet one did not disobey Hades. It left her confused, even.

Was this a shame to her, an affront to her husband on the Surface? Yet it did not tally; why leave her to care for his son, the heir apparent and Prince of this Underworld? She had seen the care devoted to him by Nyx, nobody could say that having Night incarnate suckle the babe was unworthy. Even a nymph was more appropriate, as the Thunderer himself had received. Where was the place of a mortal Queen amongst the Deathless?

Alcestis continued to think, and her thoughts floated back towards the divine one's choice of phrasing:

"... _back to Thessaly by Thrace._ "

What was in Thrace? Alcestis did not know, only that it was north of Thessaly, inhabited by the Thracians, ruled over by a son of Ares... and his mares...

With the Hero of Tiryns currently en route.

Alcestis's eyeballs spun around.

She might not have heard the whispers about the Glory of Hera, save that he was the favourite scion of Father Zeus, cheated of the kingship by Queen Hera who put his cousin on the throne, and...not on the best terms with the gods, apparently. Whatever Apollo had planned, he was immortal and could survive it.

Yet Alcestis, and her poor husband, will have to face Apollo's current target for an eternity.


	4. Setting out

"Your Highness? Your Highness, it's time to wake."

Though the boy was the very reason she was in the most comfortable part of Tartarus, Alcestis could not find it in herself. The boy reminded her of poor Eumelus and Perimele, the children she had left behind in death. Where was his mother? A nymph perhaps, taken as a bride of Hades and then removed like so many dalliances with the Gods end as? The word 'nymph' did refer to brides, after all.

"Mmm..." Mismatched eyes flickered open, and the flame-footed boy sat up. "Alcestis?"

"Good... morning, my prince," Alcestis gently helped the boy up. Picking up a basin of water by the side, she dipped a linen towel and began to wash his face. "How was your sleep?"

"En." Zagreus screwed up his face, before he clapped. "Ah, what're we doing today?"

"Lady Nyx said to break fast first, before taking a walk, and then morning readings."

Zagreus pouted. "I don't wanna do readings~"

"You will have to learn a minimal standard of literacy to carry out your duties, my prince," Alcestis reminded him, wondering herself what duties the gods would have--at least, this particular one.

There were no shrines to Hades on the Surface, otherwise the lord of the dead may have seen fit to send his child out already. Yet clearly the lords Hypnos and Thanatos were already working despite their assuredly young ages relative to the gods, and their mother Night was saying nothing yet was reading bedtime stories to this boy...

The dead did not eat, so why...

Zagreus tugged on her hand as he slid into his own clothing, somehow without assistance on her part. "Let's go!"

* * *

Alcestis took Zagreus to the Lounge as Nyx had instructed, and again was struck by the relative relaxation by which men, women and... Shades... mingled around the dining hall, some of which Alcestis vaguely recognised as the famed heroes of past ages, or other warriors of ages past lost to the Shades.

"Good morning Prince Zagreus," a kindly woman presided over breakfast today. "This morning the repast are _teganites_ and butter with honey, with some preserves."

"Oh, thanks Baucis!" Zagreus started chewing. "'Ow's 'aster Phil'mon?"

"Don't speak with your mouth full, my prince, it's rude." Alcestis reminded him.

"Old Philemon is running the Taverna Amalthea up in Elysium, it's the season of the Games," Baucis reflected. "They say that Cadmus himself would be fighting against the dragon of Thebes again. You, a new nanny?"

"Yes, my lady," Alcestis nodded, still on her feet. "I am Alcestis, I just started yesterday."

"Not a lady, merely another shade who did good in life and was rewarded," Baucis corrected. "Well, myself and old Philemon usually commute between the House and the Elysian Fields, so you won't see us around much. You'll see a lot more of the _Theoi Chthonioi_. See over there?"

Baucis gestured to a corner where three armoured women were scraping each other's wings.

"I... see them. Madam," Alcestis added.

"They're the Erinyes."

Zagreus looked up from chewing his pancakes. "Alcestis? Why are you jumping?"

"She's happy, my prince, there are other ladies around," Baucis gently heaped honey by a dish close to Zagreus's plate. "Megaera is here too."

"Really?! Meg, let's eat together-"

"Later, Zag, we've got another bounty in!" A blue-skinned winged woman cracked her whip, throwing two compatriots out of the nearest window before jumping out herself.

Zagreus pouted back into his buttered _teganites_ , missing Alcestis's look of relief at missing a meal with the Avengers. "I hate it when they're so busy they can't even take the front door," he pouted. "At least then I can look out from somewhere besides the roof."

"Well..." Alcestis paused. "What about...Elysium?"

"Never been there." Zagreus sank deeper into his pomegranate juice. "Father won't let me beyond the House. It sounds nice thought... Hyp and Than and Meg and the rest can already leave for the surface. Nyx told me I can do the same, but I can totally beat Than in a race, why not?"

Why not indeed, Alcestis pondered, and almost missed Nyx coming into the room to take over Zagreus for the rest of the day.

* * *

"Okay, he's in Elysium, FYI you owe me," Hermes pressed parts of his ankle. "And I will never underestimate those Wretched Sneaks again, dammit."

"Come on, you've been through worse as a _baby_ ," Apollo acidly retorted as he tossed a jar of nectar at Hermes's head, which Apollo easily batted aside. The nectar cracked open, spilling golden liquid on the floor of the Taverna Amalthea.

"Oi, _xenos_!" The old man at the bar snapped. "You just spilled a perfectly good drink!"

" _Sorry_ ," both gods apologised, watching as the old man left to find a rag and wash-bucket.

Apollo checked his pocket-sundial which for some weird theological reason was still working underground, and contemplated: "Now we just need a way to haul Alcestis up to Elysium. Think our baby cousin would come to see Cadmus versus Dragon?"

"Most people, probably. Our baby cousin, stuck with a workaholic father and still tied to Night's skirt-hems? Unlikely." Hermes mused. "You really want to test all of Chthonia on their security?"

"We're just stealing _one_ shade," Apollo's jaw set. "One shade."

"Keep telling yourself that, bro." Hermes got up. "So. As we planned."

* * *

" _No_."

Hermes stared. He had just announced to Alcestis the whole plan on Apollo's part in Zagreus's room, and her reaction was a flat "No."

"Good woman, we are here to help you," Hermes burst out.

"My lord, perhaps it may escape you, but mortals are vulnerable to the dread lord. It is well and good that Phoebus and the Argeiphontes assist in this quest towards the unimaginable, yet in the case of failure it is we who bear the consequence."

"You are in the company of two sons of Zeus, I cannot think of any outcome other than success-!"

"Alcestis?"

"My prince!" Alcestis exclaimed. "I am sorry, I have woken you from your nap."

"S' alright." Zagreus looked around. "Are you talking to someone?"

Hermes's eyes flickered around.

"Just a passing servant, my prince," Alcestis exclaimed.

"My prince!" Hermes's voice took on a high-pitched trill, causing Alcestis to stare at him in shock. "Surely you've heard that Cadmus is fighting the Dragon at the Elysium Stadium!"

"Really?!" Zagreus sat up straighter, all thoughts of sleep faded. He then slumped. "But I can't go..."

"Well..." Hermes smirked. "I may have an idea..."


	5. Chapter 5

"Come on, Alcestis, we're going to miss the good seats!"

"My prince," Alcestis sighed, wrapping the veil tighter around herself. Parts of the gossamer was singed where a Wretched Witch had cast a spell.

"Come on, run! And far be it for me to belittle women, but those long skirts must really be impossible to run in," Hermes exclaimed as they dodged and weaved across the stone chambers that composed the labyrinth of Tartarus. "This is Tartarus, meant for every wretch who, in the course of drawing breath, failed every opportunity to leave any sort of positive impression behind."

"If we die here..." Alcestis trembled.

"As a servant of the House of Hades, you'll wash up in the Pool of Styx," Hermes dismissed. "But he will find out, and... well, you might end up permanently wandering..."

"Don't worry, Alcestis! Father won't even know it," Zagreus excitedly swung the amphora he had carried along. "It'll be great! I can finally watch those Exalted that everyone talks about!"

"Oh my dear prince, I do not know," Alcestis moaned as a Wretched Thug nearly caught them. "Is there nothing you can do, my lord-?"

"Shh! And no," Hermes sighed. "If I kill anything here, the lord of the dead will find out, and we'll be facing the whole Underworld."

"I brought arms!" Zagreus innocently said as he pulled out an iron leaf-blade _xiphos_.

Alcestis regarded the child-size sword, then a clapping Hermes, and solemnly regarded the high ceilings of cavernous Tartarus as if expecting the Thunderer to mete out punishment at any moment.

* * *

"Zag? Zag, are you there? I brought baklava..." Drapes within the House of Hades rippled as Death floated past them, calling for the Underworld's prince. "Zagreus?"

"My child."

"Mother, have you seen Zagreus?"

"I believe he mentioned he was playing ball with the nanny," Nyx slowly spoke, her dark eyes distant. "It seems, as though he has a gift for running into times of trouble, our Zagreus?"

"Mother?" Thanatos echoed, still confused.

"The Fates struck a deal with Phoebus, aided no doubt by Dionysus's strong drink," Nyx summed up. "And thus Queen Alcestis arrived in these hallowed halls long before her due, in place of her husband. Hence the Glory of Hera has come."

"Heracles... he raids us?" Thanatos asked.

"He says that he challenges the Exalted of the Elysian Fields, searching for any news of the Queen, not knowing she is already in the House of Hades," Nyx clarified.

"As long as he does not come here," Thanatos affirmed. "These heroes, though... there are too many of them. No doubt owing their bloodlines to the whims of those on the Surface."

"Does it matter? All things end." Nyx murmured. "So too, passes glory from the surface into the infinite dark."

* * *

The Asphodel Meadows were filled with the shades of the dead, too blameless to merit Tartarus yet not virtuous enough to enter Elysium, thus they drifted, mired in the vortex of Phlegethon.

"Man, feels like Hephaestus's forges in a war rush," Hermes complained. It may seem strange to the mortals who heard the story of the two brothers, Aphrodite, and a certain net, but that story was actually corrupted by oral tradition and someone -- AKA _Hera_ \-- threatening any musician who dared to report the actual version. Ares actually had a very good relationship with his armourer and the armourer's wife. So much, in fact, that the net in question had in fact contained a _third_ person, which was what all of Olympus had been laughing about.

"I'm fire-resistant, not fire-proof," Zagreus complained, still tugging on the nanny's skirts.

"I got a professional associate who can take us all, but it'll alert our Lord Uncle and that's not... a good thing," Hermes decided at last, even as he hopped from one foot to another. "Getting through, getting through... alright."

"Huh?" Alcestis echoed before Hermes turned, and picked Zagreus up to stuff into her arms. "My lord, I- ahh!"

Hermes had slung both of them into a carry, and thus proceeded to race across the flames of the Phlegethon, leaving shades drifting in their wake.

Soon flames gave way to mists, heat gave way to a spring chill, and then a splash of the Lethe's waters caused Hermes to skip onto the Elysian Fields before he suffered debilitating amnesia.

"Oi! Who goes there?!"

The shade who had tossed the water started in shock. "Asclepius, son of Apollo. I'm a physician."


End file.
